1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an apparatus for controlling the feed rate of crop materials toward a chopping and disintegrating rotor of a processor having a feed tub supported for pivotal movement between a tilted, crop loading position and an upright, crop processing position.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In recent years, the use of machines known as tilt-tub bale processors has gained widespread acceptance. The tub of such processors, as the name implies, is tiltable 90-degrees about a horizontal axis for loading large, round bales of hay by scooping the same from the ground as the machine is backed toward and into the materials. Once loaded, the tub is returned to an upright position and the chopping rotor disintegrates the materials and directs the latter through a discharge spout. An example of a tilt-tub processor is described and illustrated in U.S. Pat. No. 4,448,361, dated May 15, 1984.
The chopping rotor of tilt-tub bale processors is located within an open-topped rotor chamber that is mounted on a mobile chassis of the processor. On the other hand, a floor of the tub, being mounted for simultaneous movement with walls of the tub during pivotal motion of the tub about its horizontal tilting axis, has an opening disposed in directly overlying disposition to the open top of the rotor chamber to enable materials in the tub to pass through the floor and into the chamber. The shape of the opening in the floor is complemental to the configuration of the opening in the top of the rotor chamber in order to confine the flow of the crop materials and substantially prevent passage of the same along paths between the top of the rotor chamber and the bottom surface of the floor.
The walls of tilt-tub processors are rotatable about an upright axis when the tub is in its upright, processing position to facilitate feeding of the materials from the bale into the rotor chamber which is somewhat smaller than the entire area of the tub floor. As a consequence, structure is provided for enabling rotative movement of the tub walls relative to the floor so that the opening in the floor is inevitably in alignment with the underlying open top of the rotor chamber when the tub is in its upright, processing position.
The rotor of the processor typically carries a number of hammers which chop and otherwise disintegrate the crop materials. The circular path of the outer edge of the hammers during rotation of the rotor includes a portion extending through the opening of the floor and into the bale receiving receptacle thereabove, to allow the hammers to contact and break away crop materials from the bottom of the bale while the forces of gravity continuously urge remaining crop materials of the bale in the downwardly direction toward the hammers.
Conventionally, the top of the rotor chamber carried a number of grid members or bars which extended from one side of the opening to another between the paths of travel of adjacent hammers. The grid members served to support the bale and thereby partially restrict the quantity of crop materials in engagement with the same in an attempt to deter plugging of the rotor as occurs when the flow rate of materials toward the same exceeds the processing capacity of the hammers.
During rotation of the rotor, a limited space exists between the paths of travel of adjacent hammers. Thus, the supporting grid members were heretofore fixed to top portions of the rotor chamber in order to assure that the hammers would not come into damaging contact with the grid members during the relatively high-speed rotation of the rotor. Since the floor of these types of processors is tiltable relative to the top of the rotor chamber, the conventional practice of fixing the grid members to the rotor chamber provided assurance that contact between the hammers and the grid members would be avoided and also served the purpose of providing further bracing for the open-topped rotor chamber.
However, plugging of crop materials is still occasionally observed in tilt-tub processors for one reason or another. Unfortunately, once the speed of the rotor decreases due to plugging, tilting of the tub to raise the floor of the tub away from the rotor chamber often does not solve the problem because a large portion, if not all, of the crop materials within the tub may still pass through the opening and bear against the rotor. It would be desirable, therefore, to provide an inexpensive solution for these and other problems.